The subject matter disclosed herein relates to metering systems and more specifically, to metering platforms utilized in utility meters.
Generally, a utility meter may monitor consumption of a utility service, such as electrical power, natural gas, or water. More specifically, a utility meter may interface with meter programs, advanced metering infrastructure (AMI), billing systems, and the like. For example, the utility meter may transmit billing data, such as energy usage data, to a utility provider's billing system to bill the consumer according to various communication protocols, such as American National Standards Institute (ANSI) C12.18. Additionally, the billing data may be communicated in data tables, such as those defined by American National Standards Institute (ANSI) C12.19. However, as new metering platforms are developed, the new metering platforms may be incompatible with the meter programs, AMIs, and/or billing systems designed to interface with previous metering platforms. For example, because new metering platforms may aim to improve on previous platforms, the data collected, the communication protocols, and/or the user interfaces may differ from previous platforms. Similarly, meter programs, AMIs, and/or billing systems designed to interface with metering platforms designed by varying manufactures may also be incompatible.
Accordingly, it would be beneficial to enable a utility meter to interface with meter programs, AMIs, billing systems, and the like designed for other metering platforms. For example, this may include enabling the utility meter to emulate the functionality and/or interface of a different metering platform.